


Odds and Ends

by squeaklings



Category: Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Genre: Character Study, Ficlet Collection, Gen, Navel-Gazing, One Shot Collection, Pre-Series
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-12-16
Updated: 2016-12-20
Packaged: 2018-09-09 01:55:25
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 379
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8871211
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/squeaklings/pseuds/squeaklings
Summary: Collection of drabbles/ficlets, not necessarily connected to each other.
Chapter 2: Jealousy.Connie finally meets Smoky Quartz.





	1. Mud

**Author's Note:**

> Written to the prompt "mud" in an attempt to get my writing muse back. Set pre-series.

The trail of mud led straight to the bathroom. Pearl stared at it for a long moment before she stood, brushed off her knees, and followed it. Steven stood on a stool, a clump of mud on the edge of the sink and a hairdryer in his filthy hands. 

“Steven?”

“Pearl!” He fumbled the hairdryer, recovered, and beamed at her.

“What are you doing?”

“Making a Gem for Dad for his birthday.” He brought the hairdryer closer to the misshapen gunk on the sink. “He said gems are made when rocks and dirt get reeeeeally hot, but all I had was mud.”

Pearl stared at the young child for a very long time before she reached over to unplug the hairdryer. Steven looked at her in surprise as she lifted him off the stool and set him on the ground.

“That’s a nice thought, Steven, but it won’t work. You’d need much, much more heat than a hairdryer could provide.” She ruffled his hair and gave him a bright smile. “Now why don’t we get you cleaned up for dinner?”

When the moon was high above and Steven was fast asleep, Pearl found her way back to the bathroom and the half-dried lump he’d lovingly placed on the nightstand beside the sink. It drooped like the misshapen mess it was, and Pearl carefully picked it up to turn it in her hands.

“As if you could ever be one of us.”

Greg’s gift crumbled between her fingers as she slowly crushed it, mud and dirt oozing across her hand, and Pearl took pleasure in watching it crack and break and fall to nothing in the garbage at her feet.


	2. Jealousy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Connie finally meets Smoky Quartz.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Continuing the trend of darker introspection.

“Nice to meet’cha, I’m Smoky Quartz.”

Connie eyes the hand in front of her, then the other two, then Smoky’s face. They sport a huge grin, and it’s so easy to see Steven in that smile. Of course he’s going to fuse with the others—he’s a Gem, it’s natural. They only fused at all because he worried he couldn’t do it. This is fine, it’s good. They’re another friend and ally, and Smoky’s existence doesn’t diminish Stevonnie’s at all.

Not at all…

“Likewise,” Connie answers, but when she finally does shake Smoky’s hand, there is no warmth to it.


End file.
